Smartflix – Access the entire Netflix catalogue, region-free | Hacker News Reader

Smartflix – Access the entire Netflix catalogue, region-free

smartflix.io

56 pointscalbearia55 comments

> Smartflix is a simple application that combines an index of Netflix content available worldwide, an optimized proxy service and a chromeless web browser that embeds the Netflix web player.

Welp, this will be shutdown anytime soon since it is an obvious violation of the Netflix TOS.

or they turn into the streaming equivalent of the Piratebay.

Could they shutdown the site itself though? Sounds like the TOS violations are from the users themselves, not the site

Site is helping violating copyright. Will be closed very soon.

Looks like it has already happened. Getting a "We were unable to process your request" - haven't done any more investigating though.

I maybe wrong but I don't think Netflix has these restrictions just to fuck with people and ruin their day. It would seem from their implementation point of view, simply having same content everywhere would be easier. I suspect these are enforced by licensing rules from those who own the content. Anyone want to confirm that?

This might get Netflix in trouble if those who own the contents will see it, see Netflix not to anything about and either increase their fees or refuse to let Netflix license the contents.

Aren't these licensing rules precisely designed to fuck with people and ruin their day?

I'm sure Netflix would wholeheartedly agree. It's no surprise they've pushed so hard into self-published content where they no longer have to deal with this.

Probably but not by Netflix. By doing this to Netflix it ensures their service will be more expensive, or that content will simply disappear and people will get from 10 different website of whoever owns and decides to run their own appstore and media streaming service.

Your assumption is almost certainly correct - it almost certainly has to do with negotiated license agreements for content.

I'm fairly certain this will get a cease & desist letter before content providers go after Netflix - although their smartflix.io 's whois information points towards a UK registration, so it might have to wait till someone at Netflix UK Legal wakes up.

I don't understand. I mean I agree that at some point smartflix is going to get into trouble for doing this, but I doubt it will come from Netflix (unless forced to). As far as legalities are concerned, Netflix is serving content allowed in country X to an IP address located in country X. Netflix is not breaking copyright that I can see. Why should Netflix worry?

They've been known to send cease and desist letters at the very least: http://www.itbusiness.ca/news/netflix-sends-cease-and-desist...

Not sure if it's ever become more serious than that though.

They've reserved the right to cancel accounts for using proxies.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/netflix-vpn-cheat-accounts-be-termi...

This shouldn't be confused with SmartFlix.com, which is like Netflix DVD, but for instructional and educational videos:

https://smartflix.com/

So if I have a Netflix account in my home country, I can access content from other regions as long as I go through the corresponding proxies? Or do I need an account in each region I'm trying to access?

The former. The accounts are "global" and the catalogue you can access is based on your current IP address.

Thanks!

I wish Netflix would publish their per-region catalogue, so we don't have to resort to (often inaccurate) third party lists.

TBH I think it would be a pain for them as it changes all of the time. I can just imagine the complaints and refund requests because they read that show X was available in their country then it disappeared a week after they signed up. I think Netflix is trying to sell a pool of non-specific movies. But yes, it would be useful.

By merely accessing a country-specific DNS server, Netflix will serve up the country-appropriate selection. You don't need to proxy your traffic through a VPN for this to work. There are DNS services which let you pick which country you would like to appear from and people use this for Netflix, Hulu, and others.

This is not entirely accurate. The way these DNS services work is that they return a different IP address (one they control) for certain Netflix domains. Then they do TCP proxying between you and Netflix to get around the region restrictions.

tl;dr: It routes your Netflix traffic through proxy servers in other countries, thus granting you access to content available in that region.

It seems to me that Netflix could easily just block traffic from the proxies' IP addresses, should this start to bother them or their licensees.

I think they have, I just tried to use it and I'm getting a Netflix site error.

Advertising this is a bad idea and I'm 99% sure this is going to get taken down because of it :p

yes. If you build an obviously illegal service, stay under the radar for god sake.

This seems like it'll get DMCA'd or something... I doubt netflix will like it too much.

Hmmm people seem to be pretty shooken up w/ the whole C&D bit, meanwhile here I am worrying about putting my credentials into this custom browser. At the very least I would like to compile this myself from the source. Thats just me :)

Netflix data from across all regions is provided by the great folks at uNoGS.com — by far the most accurate Netflix database on the Internet. Check them out!

Now that's useful!

I had a quick look at uNoGS based on personal knowledge, and just across the few titles I examined, they had numerous inaccuracies -- both missing regions that have support and also missing any regions/listings for titles I know Netflix streaming is currently carrying.

Side note, does anyone know if there's a way to determine what's available on Netflix in each country so you could emulate this manually? i.e. any public catalog search engine?

From the bottom of that page:

> Netflix data from across all regions is provided by the great folks at uNoGS.com — by far the most accurate Netflix database on the Internet. Check them out!

So yes, you can use the exact same database: http://unogs.com

Missed that, thanks.

The smartflix page states they are using http://unogs.com/

You can use http://moreflicks.com to find out in which country a movie is available. Not quite finding out everything that's available but still useful.

I can't see how they think they can get away with charging for a service that defeats restrictions which were deliberately put in place by Netflix.

I find that a bit frustrating too, though to be fair it's not Netflix's fault those restrictions are in place - they're just complying with copyright laws.

At least it's not as bad as Paragon charging for basic NTFS reading/writing functionality on Mac OS X.

https://www.paragon-software.com/home/ntfs-mac/

Paragon puts in a non-trivial amount of effort to build functionality that people are willing to pay for. I'm not sure how that's bad at all.

Thinking about it further, I guess my main beef is with Apple for not including that functionality in the first place, and I don't like the idea of paying money for something that should be free in essence.

It's also why I don't like how mIRC was so popular, despite numerous open-source IRC clients being available. And I'd feel pretty uncomfortable paying for text-editors like Sublime Text or TextMate. But that's just me :).

Implementing NTFS is non-trivial. Why should they not be able to ask money for that?

This isn't a product I would be proud of. Netflix doesn't block content because they feel like it, they do it because of licensing issues in the various different countries. It is not your choice as a user to be able to access whatever content you please, as you are a customer of Netflix and must abide by their terms of service. Don't like it? Don't use Netflix.

And this service charging for breaking Netflix's ToS? Super sketchy. I personally hope this is shutdown before this team can start making money off of it.

Absolutely agree. I can't imagine that someone built this without considering how illegal (immoral?) it is.

How could this be considered immoral?

Because you are making money off of breaking someone else's terms of service?

It is quite easy to make the case that breaking bad rules is moral. In this case, ridiculous region-based restrictions on copyrighted material are the bad rules being broken. These are paying customers, after all. Why should it matter where they watch what they paid to watch?

> Why should it matter where they watch what they paid to watch?

Because they are watching things they didn't pay to watch.

If, for example, HBO locks up rights to broadcasting a movie in US, Netflix might be able to get the rights in the UK. Watching it in the US via a UK Netflix proxy is (theoretically at least) depriving HBO of revenue, since they paid for exclusivity.

That's really HBO's problem, then, for thinking they can continue to forcibly segregate the world. I'll note that I don't use this service or any like it, but I do think that people need to keep pushing against the insane excesses of copyright through the political process, through education, and through civil disobedience.

I sure hope no one invested in this company. This will be destroyed once Netflix's lawyers see this.

I hope they get a C&D from Netflix, I see services like this ruining Netflix for the rest of us who actually know what they are doing, rather than Joe user who could care less and just wants more movies... causing push back from the industry.

I also wish bad things upon people.

You are already breaking Netflix's Terms and Conditions by doing this. It's just when a few people break the rules, they go unnoticed, and perhaps those who make the rules don't care. When the masses do it then it's a problem that then gets special attention.

Netflix has been really chill about this in the past, they were extremely aware they had many thousands of Australian subscribers before Australia had its own Netflix. I don't think they're particularly bothered about individuals getting around regional restrictions, but when another entity is trying to profit from that...

You have a valid point. I've been wondering when they will be forced to clamp down on cross-region browsing. There was already a rumor/story this was impending, some months ago, but it apparently did not come to pass -- yet.

In my case, in particular I'm interested in foreign language content that Netflix will not carry in my region -- even though licensing might be a relative pittance compared to other contracts.

In that vein, while Netflix has been promoting its English language (and transposed to Seattle) remake of "The Killing", the original Danish production is simply stellar and well worth watching, particularly if Scandinoire is your kind of thing. UK Netflix still had the first two seasons up until a few months ago, when they dropped. But, lo, January is here and they are back. Wish they would add the third season, though.

When masses break rules it's often a sign that there's something wrong with the rules.

Yes I want unlimited free content for $7.99/mo. What's so hard to understand?

You could look at the argument a bit more charitably, as in, "I don't want to be treated as a digital inferior just because of the country I happened to be born in." If $X/mo is good enough for a certain lineup in the US, it should be good enough for the same lineup anywhere.

valid point.

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